Construction Party

Calvin and Brett celebrated their birthdays together with a construction party. Let's face it, parties are for girls, but if men are going to have a party this is what it is to look like.

Exterior painting



Interior Painting



Even Hudson dawned a construction hat although he performed more of a supervisor role.

Teaching boys to be men. Through the manly task of playing with power tools. The boys enjoyed the raw power of 14.4 volts of Dewalt cruising through their finger tips.

Here is Abby at her best. She excels at de-construction.



Then there is clean up. The worst part of tearing down is having to clean things up afterwards. Calvin is "cutting the grass" with his new talking lawnmower. Hands down this is his favorite toy which he received at this party. It even burps!

And then there is Dumpster Truck Dirt Cake to top off a hard days work.


HAPPY BIRTHDAY CALVIN!!!

Hope Falls Butterflies

Since I have Mondays off we took a family hike up to Hope Falls. At the beginning of the trail there were a bunch of butterflies hovering around in this one area. They were beautiful.

We're Off!

No she did not carry all three of them - at least not the whole time!

Here is the bridge. The deceiving, misleading bridge...

Calvin treks on ahead into the unknown.

Tiring out. Abby and Calvin were starting to show fatigue as well.

Lost...

I must admit that we got a little lost. The sign to the falls is only about 1/4 of a mile in the trail but we missed it. We were busy taking pictures of the kids. We crossed the bridge when we shouldn't have. We ended up hiking probably about another mile and a half before we turned around and hiked that mile and a half back and then another half mile to the falls.

The fun thing is that Abby and Calvin can only walk for so long. I carried Calvin on my back in a carrier and carried Abby most of the way by her hanging on to my front. Needless to say that I am a wee bit tired and sore. Three plus miles of carrying two kids!

Our slight detour did lead us to another adventure which the kids really enjoyed - frog hunting. We came across a few frogs, but they were too quick and slippery. I used to be able to catch them with ease when I was younger. I must be out of shape. Plus it was a little hard with Calvin on my back. I know, excuses, excuses.

Hope Falls at Last!

We finally made it to the falls!



Here is Abby and Papa.

Calvin with a death grip on Papa.

He seemed to prefer throwing rocks into the water. If you look closely you can see the actual splash captured by the camera.

He is glad to not be attached to his Mama.

He is not so glad to have his toes dipped into the cold water!

Three Peas in a Pod

Swinging Away

Husdon loves relaxing in the backyard swing.

Discovery

One of the nicest things about summer is that it calls us to the outdoors. And what do the outdoors call us to do? Explore and discover. Here Abby and Calvin have discovered a caterpillar.

Of course, Abby is enjoying her discovery, but look at Calvin's face: shear amazement. He is patiently waiting a turn to hold this amazing creature. He was enthralled.